5G security: Analysis of threats and solutions

The discovery process of OPC Unified Architecture (OPC-UA) is well defined but lacks flexibility when implemented in large networks. While the standard provides concepts for local and global discovery services, the core assumption is that all clients and servers are aware of the discovery server(s) in the network. This dependency is a barrier for Plug-and-Play installations and is overcome by self announces via the multicast Domain Name System (mDNS), however, this scales badly with an increasing number of network nodes and deployed servers. We propose a discovery approach based on Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV), that installs a plug-and-play mechanism for global OPC-UA discovery in modern virtualized networks.

It is our great pleasure to welcome you to the 2018 ACM International Workshop on Security in Software Defined Networks & Network Function Virtualization - SDN-NFV Security'18. SDN-NFV Security'18 offers a unique opportunity by bringing together researchers from academic, industry, as well as government agencies to discuss security challenges faced by two emerging networking paradigms, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV). SDN-NFV Security'18 solicits the submission of original unpublished ideas in 6-page long papers and 4-page short papers that address the latest practices, experiences, and lessons learned on SDN and NFV security. The call for papers attracted submissions from Europe and the United States. SDN-NFV Security'18 accepted 3 full papers be presented in this workshop, after a rigorous review process (at least 4 reviews for each paper) and discussion phase. In addition, we have invited 8 papers (5 full papers and 3 short papers) from domain experts to be presented in the workshop.

In this era wireless technology gaining more popularity, people prefer wireless communication over wired communication due to mobility, scalability and ease of access. However, the traditional wireless network is complex, vendor dependent and inadequate feasibility to incorporate new services, protocols, and APIs. The rapid growth in wireless network raises many thoughtful challenges for network and telecom operators. On such grounds, Innovation of Software Defined Network (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) for mobile network opens a new arena of research. This research article presents future mobile Internet architecture (FMIA) with the integration of twin technologies, SDN and NFV that enable rapid access to Internet services. Moreover, the network manager can control services provided by ISPs through proposed architecture.

Chapter 3 - HetNet/M2M/D2D communication in 5G technologies

Networking technology is slowly but steadily adopting two key principles from cloud computing, namely, softwarization and modularization. This has resulted in the success of technologies such as Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV), which are being adopted by mobile networking as well. In the meantime, cloud computing has been revolutionized by serverless computing, with the Function-as-a-Service (FaaS) paradigm enabling extreme scalability in a convenient manner.

5G is raising high expectations, offering new avenues for research, and paving the way to a safer and highperforming set of innovative use-cases. For use-cases related for instance to Internet of Things (IoT), self-driving vehicles, or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), the programming and management of the underlying network resources will be carried out in a dynamic and scalable manner. In this vein, many enabling technologies are adopted by service providers, cloud providers and enterprises, such as Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV).

5G networks represent a paradigm shift from their 4G predecessors, engineered to cater to the burgeoning demands of densely populated areas and the high data throughput requirements of the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart city infrastructures. Beyond enhancing fundamental network attributes such as reliability, availability, and security, 5G introduces architectural innovations to accommodate these advanced needs. This paper delves into the architectural nuances of 5G, focusing primarily on the Standalone (SA) deployment method, distinguished by its utilization of network slicing. This approach leverages cutting-edge virtual network technologies, including Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV), to forge virtual network slices tailored to diverse consumer needs. Such customization is imperative for meeting the expansive and varied connectivity demands characteristic of 5G networks.To navigate the complexities of 5G architecture, this study advocates for the adoption of Reference Architectures (RAs), which provide a high-level abstraction framework for dissecting and understanding intricate systems. By proposing a model that outlines the standalone architecture of 5G networks, our research lays the groundwork for evolving this model into a comprehensive RA for 5G. This foundational work is instrumental in equipping system designers with the tools necessary for generalizing systems to manage design and deployment challenges effectively, as well as the heterogeneity inherent in system components. Additionally, our proposed model facilitates the establishment of a common vocabulary, promoting a coherent understanding of component interactions and offering a unified system perspective. Ultimately, this paper contributes a pivotal model that not only enhances our comprehension of 5G network architecture but also paves the way for future advancements in network design and deployment, promising to significantly impact the development of smart cities and IoT ecosystems.Keywords: 5G, 5G architecture, Reference architecture, patterns. Network slicing, Network Function Virtualization, Virtual Network Function.

Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) are transforming Data Center (DC), Telecom, and enterprise networking. The programmability offered by P4 enables SDN to be more protocol-independent and flexible. Data Centers are increasingly adopting SmartNICs (sNICs) to accelerate packet processing that can be leveraged to support packet processing pipelines and custom Network Functions (NFs). However, there are several challenges in integrating and deploying P4 based SDN control as well as host and sNIC-based programmable NFs. These include configuration and management of the data plane components (Host and sNIC P4 switches) for the SDN control plane and effective utilization of data plane resources. P4NFV addresses these concerns and provides a unified P4 switch abstraction framework to simplify the SDN control plane, reducing management complexities, and leveraging a host-local SDN Agent to improve the overall resource utilization. The SDN agent considers the network-wide, host, and sNIC specific capabilities and constraints. Based on workload and traffic characteristics, P4NFV determines the partitioning of the P4 tables and optimal placement of NFs (P4 actions) to minimize the overall delay and maximize resource utilization. P4NFV uses Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) based optimization formulation and achieves up to 2. 5X increase in system capacity while minimizing the delay experienced by flows. P4NFV considers the number of packet exchanges, flow size, and state dependency to minimize the delay imposed by data transmission over PCI Express interface.

Attack-aware Security Function Management

Software Defined Network (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) are attracting the attention of telecom operators. The telecom environment requires a set of Carrier Grade requirements such as high availability, high throughput and low latency. SDN faces challenges to meet the Carrier Grade. Based on the JAIN SLEE component model and the Libfluid OpenFlow driver, this work proposes the CREDENCE SDN controller. Our evaluation shows that CREDENCE controller offers a higher throughput and a lower latency when is compared to ONOS and OpenDayLight.

SummaryAs an emerging technology, blockchain (BC) has been playing a promising role in today's software‐defined networking (SDN)‐enabled Internet of Things (IoT) applications. Because of the salient feature of the network function virtualization (NFV) techniques, SDN can ensure an IoT system runs efficiently and smoothly in a cloud‐driven ecosystem. When cloud‐enabled systems encounter immense security and operational challenges caused mainly by third‐party dependency, large‐scale data communication, and maintenance, BC offers effective and robust data transfer solutions without incorporating intermediaries over the distributed network. With the increased SDN‐BC convergence in the IoT domain, the underlying challenges and perspectives deserve proper attention methodically and structurally. From the motivation of addressing such issues, this study provides necessary insights to combine those for successful plug‐and‐play. Therefore, the study includes purposefully investigating current state‐of‐the‐art to extract the research trends, future directions, and perspectives in this domain. This study provides a comprehensive survey of IoT, SDN, NFV, and BC‐enabled emerging technologies. More importantly, the authors intelligently integrated the four different technologies—IoT, SDN, BC, and NFV based on characteristics, scopes, challenges, taxonomies, and tables in numerous areas. Initially, the authors introduce the SDN‐IoT ecosystem in brief and address the features and applications. We took a close look at the SDN's overall taxonomy based on security, environment, scopes, and challenges. We also briefly describe the integration of SDN‐IoT with the NFV ecosystems. Moreover, we review the prospect of BC technology from security perspectives, its extent, challenges of practical implementation, and the possible integration of IoT regarding smart applications. Finally, this study highlights several future directions based on these technologies.

The recent trends in software-defined networking (SDN) and network function virtualization (NFV) are boosting the advance of software-based packet processing and forwarding on commodity servers. Although performance has traditionally been the challenge of this approach, this situation changes with modern server platforms. High performance load balancers, proxies, virtual switches and other network functions can be now implemented in software and not limited to specialized commercial hardware, thus reducing cost and increasing the flexibility. In this paper we design a lossless software-based switch for high bandwidth data acquisition (DAQ) networks, using the ATLAS experiment at CERN as a case study. We prove that it can effectively solve the incast pathology arising from the many-to-one communication pattern present in DAQ networks by providing extremely high buffering capabilities. We evaluate this on a commodity server equipped with twelve 10 Gbps Ethernet interfaces providing a total bandwidth of 120 Gbps.

Internet of Things (IoT) has been increasingly developed to provide essential IoT services ranging from personal health, smart homes to smart cities, and critical infrastructures. Sensor/IoT devices are indispensable elements in these systems/services. However, they are too rigid to permit reconfiguration for changes after their implementation. This makes it difficult to provision IoT services on demand and causes inefficient utilization of resources. Software-defined networking (SDN) and Network function virtualization (NFV) are emerging solutions to the programmability of network functions. Provisioning IoT services on demand is a natural utilization of programmability. Inspired by the benefits of SDN-NFV programmability, this paper proposes a softwaredefined virtual sensor (SDVS) that enables the programmability of IoT devices in accordance with IoT applications on demand. The paper presents the design and implementation of the proposed SDVS and demonstrates its use in an on-demand IoT services scenario.

Multipath algorithms except Equal-Cost Multi-Path(ECMP) which has been widely used in networks are difficult to apply, because multipath provisioning is more complex at cross layers and multipath routing need to get all nodes' information. To address the dilemma, this paper proposes a multipath network virtualization implementation scheme with Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV). In this scheme, SDN schedules network resources in a global view for selecting multiple paths and computing weight of each path, and NFV provides computing and storage resources to split flow, add tag, recover flow, to name a few. This paper also proposes a multipath algorithm for elephant flow with network virtualization. Besides, we build an experimental platform based on OPNFV and SDN, and conduct experiments under this experimental platform. The results show that our proposed algorithm applied on multipath network virtualization experimental platform has superior performance than ECMP applied in networks without virtualization.

Virtual Private LAN Services (VPLS) is an Ethernet based VPN (Virtual Private Network) service which provides protocol independent and high speed multipoint-to-multipoint connectivity. In this article, we discuss the possibility to use emerging networks concepts such as Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) to improve the performance, flexibility and adaptability of VPLS networks. SDN and NFV based VPLS (SoftVPLS) architectures offer new features such as centralized control, network programmability and abstraction to improve the performance, flexibility and automation of traffic, security and network management functions for future VPLS networks.